Chapter 331: Gold Coins, Money-Seeking Spirits, and the Crystallized Sand-Eating Castle Lord
Since Leihe said that some props need to be prepared, let me explore the surroundings first.

Luo Mu took a flashlight and walked to the tilted watchtower, observing this building which was said to have been built during the ancient Padya Empire.

The tower is made of rough stones. Under the light of the flashlight, you can clearly see that the stone surface has become smooth and hard after being polished by wind and sand. I don’t know what kind of stone it is that can be exposed to wind and sun in this hot desert for such a long time and only tilt slightly, with most of the tower body sunk into the sand.

The tower almost blended into the dark night. If it weren't for the car lights before and the flashlight now, Luo Mu might not have noticed that there was a watchtower buried here when passing by, and under the watchtower was the tomb of a former official of the Pardia Empire.

Just as Luo Mu was observing around the tilted watchtower with a flashlight, the thick gravel piled up under his feet began to flow slowly at a speed that could not be detected, under the control of some mysterious force.

At the top of the tilted watchtower, a tiny man about ten centimeters tall, hiding in the dark, cautiously poked his head out and looked at the sand below with some fear.

It wanted to alert the humans below, but was afraid of the big guy hiding in the sand, so it was in a state of conflict.

After walking around the tilted watchtower for about ten minutes, Luo Mu, who was almost tired of looking at the tower, planned to summon Dragonite to fly to the top of the tower to take a look.

After all, the Padia Alliance did not maintain the leaning watchtower in the Hot Desert, so it would not be surprising if the building collapsed at any time. Luo Mu did not dare to climb outside the tower rashly. If he was buried alive by accident, it would not be fatal, but it would be very embarrassing.

Just as he lowered his head and was about to take out the Poké Ball, Luo Mu frowned slightly as he looked at the bottom of his feet.
If it wasn't my illusion, the sand seemed to be moving slowly?

Before Luo Mu could think clearly, the next moment, Lei He not far away suddenly let out a scream.

"what!"

Luo Mu quickly looked over there and saw Lei He, who was carrying a large box with unknown contents in it. She looked at her feet gradually sinking into the yellow sand and subconsciously let out a surprised scream.

Then, forcing herself to calm down, Leihe quickly realized that some Pokémon was causing trouble. She planned to take out the Poké Ball and ask the Puffball, whose mental strength had been mostly restored after a day's rest, to help her get rid of the yellow sand that was binding her feet.

At this moment, an orange-yellow shadow passed across the dark night sky, and Leihe and the large box in her arms were pulled out of the yellow sand by Dragonite and stopped directly in mid-air.

"thank you"

Dragonite brought Leihe to Luo Mu. Leihe, who was standing firmly on the ground again, felt the sand on her shoes. She felt uneasy but did not forget to thank Luo Mu and Dragonite.

Although Leihe is fully capable of saving herself, it is a fact that Luo Mu and Dragonite did save her.

Luo Mu nodded slightly, accepting Lei He's thanks, and then asked, "Are you okay?"

"It's okay, but"

Lei He looked into the distance and saw that the flow seemed to have accelerated because of her escape. It had already swallowed up half of the off-road vehicle's tires and was about to touch the yellow sand at the base. She frowned slightly.

"There is something under the yellow sand. It should be a Pokémon."

Luo Mu nodded slightly: "I know, and it's a ghost-type Pokémon that's particularly good at hiding its aura, so you and I didn't notice it before."

The Dragonite that was flapping its wings and hovering in mid-air beside the two of them also vaguely sensed some vague breath under the yellow sand, and was moving its sights to find the location of the guy's real body.

At this time, Luo Mu also completed the communication with the system and learned the true identity of the Pokémon hiding under the yellow sand and secretly planning to swallow Leihe and himself, as well as its location.

"Dragonite, use the water cannon on the left rear tire of the off-road vehicle!"

Under Lei He's surprised gaze, Luo Mu suddenly spoke to command Dragonite.

What surprised Lei He even more was that in the next second after Luo Mu's voice fell, Dragonite completed charging in its mouth, and the azure water quickly gathered and turned into a thick water column that pierced through the night and the air, and immediately descended on the location where Luo Mu pointed.

Leihe believed that even Zoroark, who lived with her day and night, might not be able to achieve this sense of trust and execution.

Under the impact of the huge water column, the Pokémon that had sneaked out let out a strange scream and jumped straight out of the yellow sand.

In addition, due to the flushing of Dragonite's water cannon, the yellow sand in the sandy area near the off-road vehicle was quickly washed away, and the dazzling crystals that had been buried inside for who knows how long suddenly burst into bright light, turning into a beam of light that shot up into the sky, like a sharp sword piercing the sky.

"This is the Taijing Crystal!?"

Lei He immediately covered her mouth, her expression full of surprise.

After all, she is a history teacher at Orange College, so she naturally has a clear understanding of the mysterious phenomena in the Padia region since ancient times.

Once a Pokémon comes into contact with the energy emitted by a Taicrystal, it will undergo a transformation called Taicrystalization, and its body will shine with a crystalline coating like a cut gem.

It is said that the Padiya Alliance is planning to popularize the controllable crystallization technology jointly developed by Olin and Dr. Futu.

"That's right. And this one is a Pokémon that has become too crystallized." Luo Mu nodded slightly, confirming Lei He's statement, while looking at the Pokémon that jumped out of the yellow sand.

Sandbender, a ghost + ground attribute Pokémon.

Taijing attribute. Grass!
As the name suggests, the entire Pokémon looks like a castle made of yellow sand. This "castle" is composed of three parts: the main body in the middle and the hands on both sides.

The main body in the middle looks like a city gate, but it is actually a mouth with an arched structure with pink and blue stones, including on the top of its head.

The mouth of the Sand-Eating Castle Lord leads directly to the back, and there is a red shovel inserted upside down on the top of its head. It is said to have the function of a radar. When the Sand-Eating Castle Lord hides in the yellow sand, he probably relies on the shovel to locate the positions of Luo Mu and Lei He.

Originally, the water cannon should be the natural enemy of the Sand Castle, because once it is hit by excessive water, it will not be able to maintain the shape of the castle.

But it seemed that because it was too crystallized, under the water cannon of Dragonite just now, the Sand-Eating Castle still showed no sign of disintegrating into a piece of yellow sand.

After leaving the yellow sand, Sand Eater let out an angry and sharp cry, as if he was angry that Dragonite dared to use the water-attribute move that he hated the most.

On the Tilted Watchtower, because of the sharp cry of Sand Eater, the little Pokémon put down the gold coins that he had been keeping carefully, and held his head with both hands, with a look of fear on his face.

After all, it was because of the Sand-Eating Castle that it was trapped in the tower here.

The Sand-Eating Castle Lord has been running rampant near the Tilted Watchtower for a long time.

Especially when that strange crystal suddenly condensed.

After coming into contact with the crystals and having a layer of crystals coated on its body surface, Sand Eater was hit by a water-attribute move in a battle with other Pokémon. Knowing its weakness of being afraid of water, Sand Eater thought that the battle was over, but he found that his body did not collapse, and the damage of the water-attribute move was much lower than he expected.

From that moment on, Lord Sand-Eating Castle understood how powerful the effect of this crystal was.

As a ghost-type Pokémon, Sandburger has an extremely good energy perception ability. It discovered that crystals will continue to dissipate energy when exposed to the air, so it chose to control the yellow sand to bury the crystals and slow down the dissipation rate of the crystal energy.

Since then, Lord Sand-Eating has regarded the crystal and this area as his own territory.

Leihe, Luo Mu and Kuailong were like invading the territory of Sand Eater. Not only did they refuse to stand at attention and be beaten, they also took out the Taijing crystals that it had concealed with great difficulty.

I'm afraid that after a while, other Pokémon will notice the light column and come to invade.

This made Lord Sand-Eating Castle, who regarded the Taijing Crystal as his own property, extremely angry.

A brilliant light suddenly burst out of the angry Sand-Eating Lord's mouth. With the power of Taijing, an extremely bright green light beam gushed out towards Dragonite, almost illuminating half of the night sky.

A move that releases a large amount of Tai Jing energy in the body in one breath, Tai Jing Explosion!

Because the Sand-Eating Castle Lord is of the Taijing Grass attribute at this time, this Taijing burst is an attack of grass attribute.

Faced with the incoming Taicrystal explosion, Dragonite was too lazy to even dodge, and let the Taicrystal explosion explode on his body.

Luo Mu had an even weirder look on his face. Dragonite had four times the resistance to grass-attribute attacks, and multiple scales to reduce damage. This Sand-Eating Castle Lord didn't seem to be very well educated.

After the brilliant Taicrystal explosion ended, the almost unscathed Dragonite not only made Sand Eater fall into a state of disbelief and astonishment, but the little man on the top of the tower, who had already closed his eyes, was also filled with shock.

A few days ago, it saw Sand-Eating Lord use this trick to instantly kill a crocodile that looked very strong!
"Boooo~"

The strength of the Sand-Eating Castle Lord was originally far inferior to his own, not to mention this abstract grass-attribute Taijing burst.

At this moment, Dragonite felt as if he had been given a bath and his whole body was relaxed.

Feeling comfortable all over, Dragonite decided to fight back. It flapped its wings which were wrapped with air currents, and streams of high-speed air currents swept towards Sand-Eating Castle Lord, accompanied by the whistling of wind that was even more ear-piercing than Sand-Eating Castle Lord's strange scream. The quicksand around Sand-Eating Castle Lord exploded instantly, and it itself was deprived of most of its physical strength under the attacks of several violent storms.

"Click——"

A clear snapping sound was heard, and the next moment, not only was Sand-Eating Castle Lord directly knocked out of its Taicrystal state by Dragonite, but even the Taicrystal that was buried under the yellow sand with only a sharp corner exposed turned into light fragments all over the sky and was completely shattered.

"Ding"

The little man on top of the tilted watchtower cried out in surprise, his eyes flickering between Dragonite and Luo Mu.

How could such a powerful Sand-Eating Castle Lord be defeated by them like this?

(End of this chapter)